


My Most Valuable Thing

by canadino



Category: One Piece
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-28
Updated: 2016-06-28
Packaged: 2018-07-18 18:38:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7325968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/canadino/pseuds/canadino
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kept under lock and key, handled only by the most trusted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Most Valuable Thing

Zoro threw open the door to the galley with unrestrained force. The door swung along its hinges, nearly smashing up against the wall if not for the strategically placed stops Franky had the wherewithal to install knowing Luffy’s impatience to get foodstuffs down his throat. “Cook,” Zoro said, by way of announcing himself, “where are my swords?”

“Handle the door more gently, please,” Sanji said, not bothering to look over from the notebook he was scribbling something in, reading glasses perched carefully on the bridge of his nose. “As long as it’s within range of my sight in this room, it’s within my domain and I won’t stand for its abuse. And they’re right there, you blind idiot.” 

Three swords lay on the island in the middle of the kitchen, rested atop a snow white tablecloth folded into half. The sheaths were polished, which was a clear indicator they had been recently handled. As sheaths, they were meant to protect the valuable blade, so Zoro left the marks and scratches as they were as proof that they were doing their job. He grabbed Sandai Kitetsu and felt a deep low vibration in its hilt. Carefully unsheathing it, he saw it had been sharpened.

“Hey,” he said, his voice a low growl that matched the rumble from Kitetsu. “These aren’t your ordinary kitchen knives, you know.” 

Sanji did not bother rising to Zoro’s taunts, for the most part – for some parts, at the very least – but he did not stand questioning about his skills. He looked over the wire rim of his glasses. “At their base value, they’re just long, narrow knives you use to slice people. I know they aren’t meant to be sharpened with any old whetstone, but there isn’t any blade I can’t sharpen well.” Zoro’s skepticism was apparent still. “If I’ve sharpened any of them wrong, feel free to take from me something important too. I don’t take any of my nakamas’ most important things lightly, you know.” He went back to scribbling in his notebook, the tip of the pen scratching almost melodically across the paper. 

Zoro did just that, eying the grade and the grain of the steel and bringing his fingers up against the edge. His swords knew him; they did not draw blood. As he tilted the blades in the light, he glanced over at Sanji’s fingers. They were intact, no bandages or fresh scabs. “They aren’t over-sharpened,” he allowed.

Sanji grinned, although his neck was still bent over the counter. “Of course. A dull blade is harder to cut with and less accurate, but that doesn’t mean it should be as sharp as my wit.”

“Don’t flatter yourself.” Sanji did not flinch as Zoro came up behind him, but he jerked when Zoro suddenly grabbed his wrist.

“Hey. I said you can take something from me _if_ I screwed up your swords. You said so yourself they’re done perfectly. I don’t like senseless violence.”

“Be quiet. I didn’t say they were perfect.” Zoro’s thumb fit into the crook of Sanji’s wrist, where the skin was the softest. His fingers ran down the back of Sanji’s hands, rough from constant exposure to the fire from the stove; his palms were calloused from handling kitchenware and fading scars from early mistakes from the sharpest, heaviest knives. Sanji used his hands to prop himself up occasionally when he fought, but they were too precious to lean too much of his body weight on. The pads of Zoro’s fingers went over Sanji’s knuckles, thumb sliding down between his index and middle finger, pressing them up against his own palm, hardened from years of clutching his swords and his weights and dug in fingernails from frustration. Sanji kept his nails short and cut down to the quick to keep from getting grime under them that could contaminate his food preparation; they were cut just today, because the edges felt rough.

“What are you doing,” Sanji said, low and with no inflection. He let Zoro move up his hands again, pressing into the crease of his heart line.

“If you touch something that’s precious to me,” Zoro said, “then it’s only fair that I touch the thing that is the most precious to you.”

Sanji’s fingers relaxed. “Idiot,” he said again. “My hands are just one of the things that are most precious to me. They’re fundamental to my livelihood but without people to cook for, they’re worthless.” He said nothing as Zoro squeezed his palm between his fingers. “And there’s you, too.”

“I’m not someone you cook for?”

“I believe in nuance, unlike you.”

His swords were a firm, comforting weight in his grasp, and he did not take for granted the way they sat at his waist. But there were other weights he enjoyed lifting, the ones he kept in the crows nest and his nakama when he was bringing them out of harms way, and he believed in nuance too despite what some might think, because he also liked the feel of lifting Sanji up onto the counter so he could kiss him better, Sanji’s precious hands along his jaw.  

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading.


End file.
